Leaving a lasting impression

Mobile advertising growth is on the rise and SA is one of the highest ranked countries, say mobile advertisers.

The index documents the growth of mobile Internet advertising and represents inventory sold across the BuzzCity Mobile Internet Advertising Network. The report draws from the quarterly fill rate on the BuzzCity mobile advertising network and represents a measure of advertiser demand for mobile Internet advertising.

In this report, BuzzCity has tracked the growth of the ad network in Q2 2010 across more than 200 countries around the world.

The data, gathered over the three-month period from April to June, reveals an increase of 61% from the first quarter (Q1).

“During this reporting quarter, a total of 44 markets each delivered monthly traffic exceeding 10 million impressions per month - an increase from 32 markets in Q1,” says BuzzCity.

The media company adds that increased advertiser interest has come from sports brands and South African player Homeground, which took advantage of the World Cup to promote its football-related content.

“TV media and Web players such as Google, Yahoo and MSN also increased their mobile advertising campaigns, and the auto and banking sectors continued to perform strongly.”

SA ranks fourth on the company's list for the top 20 most active countries in Q2. It saw growth of 233 406 888, a 65% increase from Q1.

WWW Strategy MD Steven Ambrose says mobile technology is fast becoming the dominant technology to which the average person in SA and other emerging markets in Africa have access.

“The low penetration of other Internet access due to poor infrastructure, and the prevalence of old-style fixed-line telecommunication monopolies, have resulted in mobile communication completely dominating the continent. While the fixed-line infrastructure steadily declines, the mobile infrastructure grows exponentially.”

According to a recent Accenture survey on consumer electronics use, consumers in emerging markets are far more interested in mobile technologies than those in mature markets.

“From an LSM perspective, there's an indication that mobile Internet use strongly reflects the country's population. The mass population understands mobile Internet, and they can use it. It's your common person on the street,” notes Brett St Clair, SA country manager of mobile advertising platform AdMob.

St Clair points out that SA is probably the most competitive mobile marketing country on the planet, with 98% fill rate and making up a quarter (250 million) of the billion adverts requested in Africa in March. While the developed world goes the way of apps and rich media, locally, it's all about rich media on mobile Web.

“Advertisers have always looked for the most cost-effective methods of talking to the widest audience, and mobile access is almost the golden bullet for advertisers; it is personal, immediate, and often relevant,” says Ambrose.

He adds that the need to monetise the mobile networks, and broaden the revenue base of the operators, has led to huge innovation in mobile advertising methodologies and systems. “All this, coupled with over 100% penetration of mobile devices in SA, has led to the exponential growth being experienced.”

Ambrose says mobile advertising will steadily replace other forms of marketing and the mobile Web will merge with the fixed Web via cloud computing over the next five years.

“As a result, the nature of advertising will morph into a comprehensive and multifaceted system, which will incorporate mobile, fixed, and other forms of Internet access, all combined with ubiquitous connectivity.”

As mobile access devices become increasingly powerful and functional with devices like smartphones and tablets, the seamless nomadic online experience that the Northern Hemisphere is already starting to take for granted, will start to emerge in Africa, driven by new wireless technologies and systems, notes the analyst.

According to St Clair, mobile Internet in emerging markets will strengthen as lower cost smartphones become available.

St Clair notes that the main challenges in the market are handset capability - rolling out enough handsets that are GPRS-enabled and getting them configured to connect to the networks. “That is SA's number one mobile Internet problem, which the operators are addressing.”

Another hurdle is fixed data plans, both postpaid and prepaid. “The prepaid cost per meg needs to be a lot lower.”

He names education as the last hurdle for mobile Internet. “The publishing bases, such as major media houses, need to play a role in educating their users on the type of mobile services available and how to use them.”